The Future of Facebook

2018 was, to say the least, a pretty turbulent year for the social network giant, Facebook. With share prices dropping almost 30 per cent, following a series of scandalous press coverage around failing to protect users’ data, hate speech and their role in spreading false information.

It, therefore, comes as no surprise that researchers have found overall engagement on brand’s Facebook Pages declined by 50 per cent and average engagement per post dropped 65 per cent within an 18-month timeframe between 2017 and 2018.

Last year Facebook also made the controversial decision to reduce the influence of paid advertising appearing newsfeeds in an attempt to improve social interaction and meaningful connections between users.

Despite the negative press and the decline in users and engagements, Facebook firmly remains to be the world’s largest social network. It continues to evolve, develop and improve, and is doing everything in its power to regain the trust of those it’s lost.

It would be understandable if you were frustrated and considering reducing or ruling out Facebook from your 2019 marketing strategy. Our advice? Don’t! Follow these top tips for staying ahead of the game instead …

Keep up to Date and Take Advantage of Latest Updates
Facebook has released a few great updates recently which marketers should take advantage of as part of their 2019 social media strategy …

Story Adverts
Following the success of Instagram stories, Facebook is really pushing for businesses to get this right. The introduction of story adverts provides brands with opportunities to reach targeted users and drive business through creating new experiences. Story ads take the form of vertical, full screen, immersive 15-second videos, 5-second image ads or 45-second carousels with a call to action to swipe up to product pages.

Augmented Reality AdvertisingAR technology enables users to interact with a brand’s content by accessing Facebook’s camera and clicking a ‘Tap to Try’ call to action. This works particularly well for fashion and cosmetic brands as users can see how wearable products such as sunglasses or lipstick would look on their own face, and if they like it, they can click through to the product page to purchase.

Video Content
Video content isn’t just for YouTube. Data shows that Facebook gains an average of 8 billion video views a day, with brands posting short-form video content lasting no longer than 30 – 120-seconds, this resulted in the highest engagement on Facebook in 2018.

Publish More FrequentlyGet your number of page engagements back on track by publishing your content more frequently and consistently. Studies show that the most successful brands on Facebook post on average 4 to 5 times per day.

Leverage User-Generated ContentSharing content created by users lets your audience know that you’re noticing and appreciating them sharing their positive reviews, images and stories about your brand. A tactic that has proven to help boost brand authenticity, credibility and loyalty. If you don’t have any user-generated content, encourage your customer base to take and submit a photo of them wearing your product or using your service to Facebook as part of a competition or offer an incentive as thanks.

Monitor Progress with Facebook Page InsightsThe most effective way of monitoring if your Facebook activity is working is by discovering and analysing trends in engagement. Use the Page Insights tool to understand how your business page is performing, this will provide you with stats including the number of page likes/unlikes, reach, overall engagement, comments and shares.

Gain a Good Understanding Your Audience’s InsightsThe Audience Insights tool is great for gathering information about your user’s demographics including gender, age, education level and career. Analysing this data will provide you with an idea of your target audience’s hobbies and interests. Therefore, giving you a better understanding of what topics and content most of your audience follow and find interesting.

No matter how often Facebook gains negative press, changes its algorithms, or makes decisions which seem detrimental to business, one thing to be certain of is the leading social media network is remaining a firm and viable marketing platform for a long time to come!

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We are an advertising and marketing agency that is small but perfectly formed. We help clients with all aspects of their communication strategy including ad campaigns, marketing strategy, branding, print and online. We love what we do and we hope it shows.

We are an advertising and marketing agency that is small but perfectly formed. We help clients with all aspects of their communication strategy including ad campaigns, marketing strategy, branding, print and online. We love what we do and we hope it shows.